According to MSNBC, some vegetarians are in a tizzy because Starbucks, in response to customers who wanted more "natural ingredients," have decided to use cochineal extract, which is food dye...made from crushed bugs.

Products including the extract are their Strawberries and Creme Frappuccinos and red velvet whoopee pies.

And Strawberries and Creme is my fav, too.

The company has no plans of changing the ingredient either, so I suppose this means I have to find another way to achieve my coffee fix.

Than again, it's probably no grosser than the crap we eat on a daily basis, but sill. I hate bugs and furthermore I would be horrified in knowing I'm ingesting them. I would never be able to get rid of that "crawly" feeling. Another thing is, why are the vegans in such a fuss? I'm sure most of them have stomped a few bugs in their lifetimes, yet I suppose "all animals matter," including insects. Frankly I find the whole thing silly.

Don't know if this will help you get over your bug ingesting phobia or make you starve to death, but the FDA allows a certain amount of bugs to be in lots of different produce. As far as the vegans go, they don't like to consume animals or use byproducts of animals. Vegans have never harmed another living thing, not even a bacteria. That is why they all die so young and don't actually exist, except in hippy horror fiction.

I'm fine with eating insects over, say, some chemical compound. I would guess, just by chance, the average person consumes quite a bit of dead, crushed insect particulate in their daily food. I bet it's rather hard to keep our food supply as pure as we want to imagine.

FDA max allowed
WHEAT FLOUR - Average of 75 or more insect fragments per 50 grams. Average of 1 or more rodent hairs per 50 grams
CORNMEAL - Average of 1 or more whole insects (or equivalent) per 50 grams. Average of 25 or more insect fragments per 25 grams. Average of 1 or more rodent hairs per 25 grams, or average of 1 or more rodent excreta fragment per 50 grams.

Well, think about what cosmetics use in their ingredients. Even in ancient civilizations bugs were used as some form of cosmetic or food. It's not going to make me stop using my mascara or drink my strawberry and creme frappe. As long as I don't see a whole bug, I'm good.

This is a very normal thing. A LOT of red dye is carmine based(which is made from a beetle, which is what this is). You'd be surprised. The only reason this is news is because starbucks used to be more vegan friendly, and now some people are upset.